Cody Horn Got Her Magic Mike Role By Doing The Opposite Of How She Acted In The Movie

The Crushable office was pretty unanimously underwhelmed by Cody Horn‘s performance in Magic Mike. She wasn't awful per se, more like her reaction shots swung between the two extremes of stone-faced to over-the-top emotional. (Her one big scene is where she finds her brother, played by Alex Pettyfer, passed out in a drugged haze. I feel bad poking fun, but the way she flails around and yells, “My bruh-huh-huther!” came off as way cheesy.) I much preferred Olivia Munn.

But what's interesting is the circumstances under which Cody Horn got this romantic lead in Magic Mike. She tells HuffPo that it's “a pretty crazy story”—we wouldn't go that far, but it's certainly unexpected. Seeing as, you know, the way she acted in the interview is the complete opposite of how she came across in the movie:

They weren't going to see me because they thought I was too young, but my agent, Jason, fought for me to go in. Carmen Cuba, the casting director, agreed to meet with me, and we taped the interview. She asked me questions about my life, my dating history, things like that. We talked like girlfriends would; it was more friendly than a formal interview. I then got a call that I was to go in and audition for them, which I did. After we finished the scenes, Carmen excused the guy I was reading with and said, “This will never happen to you again for the rest of your career, but you booked the role before you came in.” I'm not sure what Steven [Soderbergh] and the producers saw in me, but I'm glad they saw something they liked!

I hate to say it, but what they say was probably her dad, studio exec Alan Horn. Curiously, he was the COO at Warner Bros. when Magic Mike (a Warner Bros. picture) was being cast.. That would probably explain why her first go-round was really relaxed and casual. It's really difficult to equate the Cody who has easygoing girl-talk with the casting director, with the Cody who comes across as so stern and unrelaxed in the movie. Or maybe she's making up the whole audition story. Because you'd think that the Magic Mike producers would've wanted her to bring that same energy and intimacy to the role, when instead her character Brooke is so closed off.